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Jets and Outflows from Young Stars: How They Help Shape the Early Solar System

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Details

Date

Wednesday, May 21 2008 - 12:00 pm, PDT

Speaker

Sienny Shang

Description

Jets and outflows from young forming stars are among the most spectacular and energetic phenomena in the night sky. They are ubiquitous in star forming regions, and signal the birth of stars like our own. Similar phenomena exist around new higher massive stars, compact objects, and even black holes. They may differ in dynamics, energetics or emission mechanisms, yet they share the striking similarities in their highly-collimated appearance and high-velocity outflowing motion of gas.

Jets and outflows play important roles in the early lives of a newborn star and help shape the early evolution of a young forming planetary system. We review status of theoretical modeling from the point of view of young stellar objects, and the multiwavelength observations of the outflow phenomena. We discuss emission mechanisms of jets and the formation of molecular outflows at the interface of theoretical interpretation and observational confrontations. We present synthetic images from the X-Wind models at the highest-angular resolution as an atlas for future planning of observations. We will touch on the connection of the highly collimated jets to the earliest processing of planetary material, and the large-scale transportation and mixing events that have been inferred to exist from the Stardust return mission.

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